A number of staff have been asked to stay at home after a worker at MSD Carlow tested positive for Covid-19.
A spokeperson for the company has told KCLR that they have identified all personnel at the site who may potentially have had contact with the employee in question and, as a precautionary measure, have asked them to stay home and follow all HSE guidance on limiting the spread of infection.
They say the site will remain operational, with all necessary protocols and precautions in place.
The full statement from MSD is as follows:
“We are aware that one employee at our Carlow facility has tested positive for COVID-19 infection. Our thoughts are with this employee and their family and we wish them a speedy recovery from this illness.
We immediately enacted our detailed and comprehensive COVID-19 response protocols and, acting with an abundance of caution, have identified all personnel at the site who may potentially have had contact with the employee in question and, as a precautionary measure, have asked them to stay home and follow all HSE guidance on limiting the spread of infection.
The site will remain operational, with all necessary protocols and precautions in place to support our ongoing critical operations, manufacturing and supplying important medicines and vaccines.
The health and safety of our teams, their families and our wider communities is a key priority for MSD at all times, particularly during the current pandemic. Earlier this year we enacted a wide range of safeguarding measures across our Ireland site network in line with recommended public health measures with the aim of limiting the opportunity for infection to spread. This included a reduction of staff on-site to essential workers only, the formation of separate teams on site, the provision of PPE across the site, sanitising and deep cleaning protocols and the introduction of contact tracing measures.
We continue to evaluate all of the measures currently in place on an ongoing basis, to ensure that we promptly implement any new or updated guidance to help prevent the spread of the virus and to protect our teams.“
